Statistician to the Stars!

A “controversial” sign sets the words, “If you think there is no God you’d better be right!” over small picture of flames.

News reports say the sign was in front of the Attleborough Baptist Church in south Norfolk, England. The very sensitive, and undoubtedly precious, civilian Robert Gladwin, 20, saw the sign and “decided to contact the police after comparing the message to other forms of hate speech.”

The police, duty bound, treated the “incident” as hate speech and got the church to agree to remove the sign.

Gladwin said, “I was just astounded really. We live in the 21st century and they have put that message – that non-Christians will burn in hell – up to try and scare people into joining their mentality.”

In other words, Gladwin reacted emotionally to the sign while wondering how anybody in these Enlightened times could react emotionally to the sign.

The question before us is not Gladwin’s obvious feminine nature—who are we to judge? Instead, we must decide whether the sign is indeed “hate speech,” i.e. a thoughtcrime.

Now either the message of the sign tells of real or of fantastical things. The sign could be relating a truth: repent and be saved or be cast outside the gates where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. If the sign’s objurgation holds, hellfire is a danger. It therefore cannot be hateful to tell somebody of this, especially in the form of an impersonal sign on private property.

The sign could be relating an approximate truth. Hell could be real but it is not meant for people, as many modern theologians insist. But then there is nothing to worry about and the sign is merely metaphorical, as the entire Bible then is.

The sign could be fantastic. There is no God, no Hell, life holds no meaning, the time we have here is everything there is. In this sad case, the sign also cannot be hate speech. It would be the equivalent of threatening to stab somebody with a unicorn’s horn, or to whack them on the skull with Thor’s hammer. The threat is entirely empty, and known to be so. Telling somebody you will sprinkle them with Pixie dust will not cause them to tremble if they believe Pixie’s do not exist.

Threats only have force if the message or circumstance is believed to be real. Gladwin must then, in his heart of hearts, believe the threat to be real. This is probably why he is quoted as saying, “It is my basic understanding that Christianity is inclusive and loving in nature.

“The message being displayed outside of the church could not be further from the often uttered phrase ‘love thy neighbour’.”

Ignore the incoherence and instead notice instead how odd it is that folks outside the Church have such a passion for preaching to those inside it. Here is what your Church really teaches. What’s happening here is that Gladwin wants to be reassured he himself is under no danger of eternal punishment. It can’t be that he already believes he is not or he could not have seen the sign as “hate” speech.

If Gladwin really did not believe in Hell, then he could not have seen as hateful a warning that he risks going there, any more than he could have seen as hateful a warning that he risks being sentenced to eternally quarry stones in Bedrock next to Fred Flintsone. That he secretly knows the truth means there is hope for Gladwin, as there is hope for all of us.

Readers, incidentally, might be curious to learn that the Catholic Church has never consigned anybody to the flames. No person in all of history was ever officially said to be in Hell, not even Judas or Ted Kennedy. The reason for this is simple enough: there is no proof any individual is. There is, however, plentiful evidence some people are, we just don’t know who. Just make sure it isn’t you.

Update Don’t forget to answer the question. If you leave the answer blank, we’ll assume you do NOT think the sign is a thoughtcrime.

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51 Comments

Quoting “It would be the equivalent of threatening to stab somebody with a unicornâ€™s horn, or to whack them on the skull with Thorâ€™s hammer.”

I would definitely be concerned if someone made one of these threats. If someone came after me with a hammer, my first instinct wouldn’t be to engage in debate as to whether the hammer in question really was Thor’s. Anyone delusional enough to make such a threat may very well be delusional enough to believe that he was in possession of the weapon in question. Although I agree that the complaint was trivial and made in the knowledge that this church did not represent a threat, it would not be my first choice of spiritual solace.

The dispute is thus revealed as intramural and doctrinal, pitting the right kind of Christians (the loving, inclusive, tolerant ones) against the wrong kind (working class nitwits). One sect owns the reigns of government, runs an unofficial established church (the most powerful kind) and gets to say what “hate speech” is; the other one doesn’t.

But it is still nonsense. For the sake of argument, I could be believing that the Devil was the only existing deity, or at least the only capable Being interested enough in people to provide them with some kind of afterlife, and that the fate of all people would be to burn in Hell for eternity. In that case, I would love te be proven wrong in the afterlife, there being none, so no eternal torment.

It’s merely stupid and ingrained with a brainwashing fear-inducing masochistic message, that unfortunately is efficient with some people. I loathe this kind of message and whatever it entails, but for goodness sake, stop censoring these things please?

Of course the sign is not hate speech. What the crowd shouted to the civil rights marchers in Wauwatosa in 1967 was hate speech. Some people cheapen vile acts by applying the same name to foo-foo.

No one goes to hell by accident, cf. Romans 2. Even those “without the law” are “a law unto themselves” and will be judged in accordance. Of course, it is easier to get lost when you don’t have a good map.

I am completely non-religious although I am not an atheist which is a position I find entirely illogical.

When I read the sign I had no reaction. To me, calling it hate speech demeans what actual hate speech is and does to society. The complaint to me was frivolous.

I like the idea of freedom of speech quite a lot. It gives me information to form opinions about the person/group making the statement. Churches often have good messages applicable to everyone, even the non-religious. This wasn’t one of them.

Briggs: the sign is not hate speech by my definition. Any Deity subscribing to the message of the sign is not one I’d worship. People with such beliefs run the risk of hating themselves, which is sad and Evil.

Robert Gladwin is behaving like an ass. People doing Evil unto themselves is strictly their business.

Whatever the merits of the logic behind the [atheist city bus] sign, it is interesting that it represented the precise logical flip-side message of the one that the Baptist Church was presenting.

Indeed. One sign posits God and invokes fear, the other posits not-God and evokes peace.

I believe that this suggests that the term â€œhate speechâ€ simply means whatever speech the politically influential do not enjoy hearing

That is what often happens in practice. The all but inevitable result is that the politically infulential then respond with hate speech of their own. Whether this reaction is due to incidental ignorance of the definition of hate speech, differing definitions of same, or willful duplicity leading to double-standards is best evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

I didn’t learn about this from editorials, I learned about it in a classroom. I don’t doubt that there are many op-ed authors out there who didn’t do that kind of homework. I would even go so far to say that some do know better, but choose to ignore the nuance. Incidental ignorance is forgiveable, wilful ignorance isn’t.

Obviously Gladwin was not sure of is belief. If you are sure of your belief you will not be afraid of such a sing.

Possibly. Many of the angsty-sort of atheists I talk to seem more afraid of the people who believe in a God-who-must-be-feared. Some such atheists react to their fears with bigoted prejudice against theism in general. Intolerance breeds intolerance, and then one has the satisfying feeling of having predicted correctly.

That satisfaction is fleeting, however, when ones own partisan group is skewered by the business end of a pike. I often point out to atheists that victory favours the majority and that perhaps they’d do better to not encourage fulfilment of their own prophesy.

The sign is not hate speech and it can only be considered a sin from someone on the outside of the church (as in someone with a different religious beliefâ€”and disagreeing with the sin would be a sin to those who put up the sign). It’s also true that unless the poor tormented soul that saw it as hate speech had a lingering feeling he might be headed in the wrong way, he would not have reacted. More interesting is the need to report it to the lawkeepers. This is a very common practice, holding that the law and morality are one in the same. If the poor tormented soul can get the law to take down the sign, then he’s off the hook for now because the law said the sign was wrong and bad and evil and he’s safe. (He’s off the hook for now because later a bit of fear might creep back in and he’d need to go to the law and get rid of whatever precipitated that bit of doubt.)

It’s a loving message but perhaps a little ham handed. The question of whether there is God or not is the most important question you could possibly consider – and yet most people on both sides of belief are cavalier with that question. Penn Jillette(atheist) said this:

â€œIâ€™ve always said that I donâ€™t respect people who donâ€™t proselytize. I donâ€™t respect that at all. If you believe that thereâ€™s a heaven and a hell, and people could be going to hell or not getting eternal life, and you think that itâ€™s not really worth telling them this because it would make it socially awkwardâ€”and atheists who think people shouldnâ€™t proselytize and who say just leave me along and keep your religion to yourselfâ€”how much do you have to hate somebody to not proselytize? How much do you have to hate somebody to believe everlasting life is possible and not tell them that?

â€œI mean, if I believed, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that a truck was coming at you, and you didnâ€™t believe that truck was bearing down on you, there is a certain point where I tackle you. And this is more important than that.â€

My vote is that it is not hate speech. It’s a message of love and concern. Some people just don’t want to be reminded of what’s at stake.

Previously: I think he acted like an intolerant jerk regardless of what his circumstances. And pox on the police for going along with it.

Though on further review, there is this:

A spokesperson for the police said: â€œNorfolk Constabulary received a report regarding a poster outside a church in Attleborough which was deemed offensive by the complainant.

â€œNational guidance required us to investigate the circumstances and the matter has been recorded as a hate incident. Having spoken to the pastor of the church, it has been agreed the poster will be taken down.â€

Still,

Chris Copsey, of the Norfolk Humanists, described the sign as â€œpernicious nonsenseâ€.

He added: â€œI believe the people of Attleborough have more common sense than to give this sign any credence.â€

In Dublinish parlance, but close enough: Spot on.

But the complaints have provoked concerns about the churchâ€™s freedom of speech.

True, some concerns. Noting that the removal appears to have been voluntary rather than mandatory mitigates the concern somewhat. I’d hope that the pastor did it not just out being neighbourly, but also paused to think about the parable of the Good Shepherd, and of the one lost sheep out of the ninenty-and-nine.

The sign is not hate speech, though it is horribly misleading. The message it showed was certainly not the “Good News” that Jesus spoke of.
Thinking the God of Israel exists is not adequate for avoiding judgment for sin, the result of shunning our relationship with Him.
Having stated that point, it is necessary to clarify, God does not send anyone to hell, but rather that disposition is a result of mankind’s each own sinful behavior which has directly has separated us from a relationship with the eternal Holy God.
Each human owns his sin and the disposition to eternity without God, that is hell.
Yet He has done everything possible to keep mankind from the self deserved hellish judgement, even to providing in Himself the propitiation for our sins to re-establish our relationship with God.

The reality is the “Good News,” that was and is proclaimed by Jesus of Nazareth, the anointed of God, is that the God of Israel is interested in re-establishing the relationship with mankind. He has done everything possible to keep mankind from the self deserved hellish judgement, even to providing in Himself the propitiation for our sins. The propitiation was purchased at a most precious price, the sacrificial death of Jesus, who was without sin, to satisfy the cost of the sin committed by mankind.
One may well ask “was this act sufficient for this purpose? ” God answered by raising Jesus from the dead as a witness to every human of His acceptance of Jesus’s sacrifice. One may well also ask “Isn’t this barbaric? Yes of course it is. Such is the true cost of our sinful behavior. The barbarism is not His, but ours.

The purpose of God’s redemption for mankind is not to just avoid hell, but rather to always enjoy the rewarding permanent relationship re-established with God, which has always been our greatest purpose for being, supersedes physical death.

The boy is only 20 years old and therefore like all young men he naturally thinks he knows better about everything. Often this feeling does not go away until the age of 30 years. Sometimes it never does so. To admit you know very little and can know very little about all the things that matter takes about seventy years.

The belief in the devil and hell is fueled by TV and computer games. and is very strong among the young , as is the vision of an afterlife of pale vague ghosts of the dead who along with zombies must give these teenagers many disturbed nights. Quite pagan and Roman
Fear of Death is the origin of evil according to the Orthodox. Read the homily from the meeting of the Pope and Patriarch Bartholomew on Pravmir. at the Holy Sepulchre. in Jerusalem.

Brandon: I cannot know with 100% certainty, but with the evidence presented and a knowledge of human behaviour, I can put it above the 95% certainty level. That’s good enough for most things, it seems. However, yes, the police were definitely the real baddies here–have they nothing better to do?
I see your next posting and I guess the pox goes on the “national guidance” whatever the heck that is.

Atheists of the sort that get rattled when theists wander into their discussion fora and start spreading fire and brimstone have about the same level of confidence that the phenomenon is explained by much the same reason: the theists are afraid the atheists might be right.

As a neutral observer, I think it’s a bit of a hoot that everybody thinks they’re such a mind reader. I know, without having to crack a stats text or pick up a calculator, that I cannot know with any certainty what goes on inside someone elses head, though with some confidence I posit that there’s a fair amount of hubris involved.

A pox on both their houses. [A humorous curse suitable for family websites expressing mild disgust at the silliness of it all. Now archaic, hearkens back to a time prior to the smallpox vaccine when it was a much more serious epithet, one of the stronger disparaging idioms one could employ against a despicable person without invoking Deity’s name in vain whilst wishfully condemning them to the Bad Place for eternity.]

I lifted “national guidance” from the news article. From context I took it to mean “consulted some laws and regulations”. No pox on that as yet, I’m not quite ready to drink ultra-concentrated Tea Party Kool-aid and advocate for total anarchy.

I do wish people would grow some thicker skin, hopefully before we get anarchy by accident.

Brandon: Actually, people are quite predictable, even on an individual basis. Since the predictions are based on “knowing the other person”, I stand by my assessment that people can be known by their actions. Is that mind reading? I don’t think so–it’s using the evidence out there and drawing a conclusion. Can it be wrong? Sure. Mostly, though, I think people want to believe no one can know what they think. It’s unnerving to some.

If you can’t know another’s mind, I am unclear how you got to “ultra-concentrated Tea Party Kool-aid” and them advocating for total anarchy. Absolutely nothing in the Tea Party (which is not even a party) advocates anarchy. Even libertarians rarely do that, except perhaps the most dedicated. The motives of the Tea Party as generally ascribed to them is based on? I’m willing to bet this does involve mind-reading or at least assigning motives and beliefs, which is what I was doing with the 20 year old. How can you describe the Tea Party in this way and then say I cannot safely claim that the 20 year old did have doubts about religion or he would not have reacted as he did. It’s not making sense to me.

Since the question before us is not Briggs’ apparent misogynism or homophobia I will initially restrict my attention to the issue of “hate speech”. Since the law can define bread as cheese and make it stick if it wants to, I can’t object to the claim that if the law defines any statement which anyone claims to be offended by as “hate speech” then by claiming offense Mr Gladwin does indeed cause the sign in question to meet that definition.

Briggs’ claim that the Church never consigned anyone to the flames would no doubt come as a surprise to Giordano Bruno (and thousands of others). The “merciful” fact that those flames were not eternal does unfortunately little to mitigate the fear they induce in one who might prefer eternal combustion while dead and insensible to the temporary kind while alive and sensible.

Oh, and on Brandon and Ray’s off-topic subthread, there are many possible scientific definitions of race. One might be that a race is any subset of humanity which consists of people whose ancestry over the last 10000 years is at least 50% from some specific region and who can be reliably identified as having such ancestry on the basis of their physical characteristics. Racism is definitely *not* just the belief that such sets can be found, but rather belief in the idea that some such sets are “better” than others.

Predicting actions and knowing thoughts are two different things. No, it’s not mind reading.

When I went from theism to hard atheism, I did have a fair amount of trying to disprove my former faith to make sure that I’d done the right thing. As angnostic in theory and soft atheist in practice it’s very much not a bother. I am not ashamed of my choices or in how I live my life. I fully expect any god(s) that exist to approve of how I’ve lived my life even though I did not swear any fealty to them. It’s easy. “There were too many to pick, so I didn’t and just tried to do the best I could.”

The prickly sort of hard atheists, I really don’t know. I think they should just get over themselves. I don’t try to get in their head, I mostly just tell them to make a little less noise for everyone’s benefit.

“Ultra-concentrated Tea Party Kool-aid anarchists” is hyperbole. I take your point, and get it that you don’t understand. I’m not trying to read their minds. I do know they don’t advocate for anarchy, but whenever a group says, “we need more efficient govermnment”, I just sort of turn off my ears. Government is hardly ever about efficieny or optimal solutions, it’s all about power and bringing home the bacon. Sometimes it actually helps, other times not.

I do better discussing specific issues. I don’t care what party someone belongs to if they make good arguments, and listen to good ones in return. My experience with tea partiers, most environmental leftists — radical idealogues in general — is that they rarely break from the party platform. Which I’m sick of. So I take potshots at the groups from time to time to blow off steam. I really can’t justify that, it just can’t always be helped.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. The various descriptions of Hell in the Bible aren’t even consistent with one another, let alone consistent with physics or common sense. The people (assuming they even existed) who describe Hell couldn’t have actually been there so are basically just making stuff up, retelling equally made-up stuff by other equally clueless people, or having ‘visions’. (i.e., they were insane) This non-evidence is then told and retold by word of mouth (Chinese whispers-style) for hundreds of years before being written down (with more mistakes) and translated (with even more mistakes). And that’s evidence? Include me out.

Anyway, judging by your comment, if extraordinary claims need extraordinary evidence, your claims are curiously exempt of presenting *any* evidence at all: apparently, all that is needed is to cobble up some incredibly stupid just-so story and everything is settled.

It’s really hard to present evidence to “prove” that something does NOT exist. We’ve never seen monsters under our bed, but we’re pretty sure they’ve not been there. But we can’t prove that they’ve never been there. Maybe they’re well groomed and don’t shed. Anything.

This drives a lot of atheists nuts because most of them I know will tacitly admit that they actually can’t disprove the existence of god(s). Where would you even look? They then start talking about Teapots in orbit around Mars. Oh, how they do amuse me sometimes.

Anyway, I don’t know your particular faith, but here’s what Paul has to say in Hebrews 11:1

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

So now we’ve gone from all but impossible to prove doesn’t exist to absolutely impossible to prove doesn’t exist. By definition, “things not seen” means “hiding on purpose”. Implying “don’t even try”. See also Tower of Babel.

So, if you’re a Christian, asking an atheist to disprove your God by presenting evidence that He doesn’t exist, pause to think about what it is you’re asking. Then maybe you’ll get a glimpse into why our fishy trombonist here got a bit hot under the collar.